


Lost It To Trying

by MyWolf



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Anxiety, Depression, HP: EWE, PTSD, Panic Attack, Parallel Travel, Parallel Universe, Time Travel, Universe Travel
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-07-30
Updated: 2017-07-30
Packaged: 2018-12-08 20:42:18
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,715
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11654352
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MyWolf/pseuds/MyWolf
Summary: The green is blindingly bright. The skin of his hands itch terribly, fingers flexing.It grows closer, brighter.And he thinks, finally.Harry wakes somewhere else, in a place where the dead are alive and the war has never ended.





	Lost It To Trying

 

 

 

It’s the itching. 

 Dragging his nails against his skin over and over and over until he scores trails of bloody red down his arms. He’s bitten his lip and all he can taste is that sickeningly familiar copper that reminds him of his childhood. Of his dark cupboard and sleepless nights of ache and pain and of his Uncle’s face purpling with anger.

 The itching.

 He makes a gurgling sound in the back of his throat, a laugh? Maybe. 

 He fiddles with the stone in one hand, and grips tightly to his wand with the other.

 He doesn’t….he shouldn’t have it with him, can’t risk his instincts. He lets it drop to the forest floor, he won’t be needing it again. 

 His heart, beating steadily faster, chest squeezing tight in a fear he doesn’t quiet feel yet. Perhaps the fear won’t ever come, perhaps he’ll die the brave man he’s been told he is. 

 Unlikely, though. Harry has been scared his entire life. 

 Violent scratching against his skin, he stumbles on into the Forbidden Forest with the gurgling in his throat. He’s walking to his death, he knows, but it’s a bit hard to comprehend. He’s alive now, but in a matter of minutes, maybe a few breaths from now….he’ll be dead. Just….dead.

 And he won’t have to feel the guilt over the deaths he’s caused, the pain and suffering on his behalf, the push, the pressure to be the leader of a cause so light it’s blinding. He’ll martyr himself and then he won’t have to worry about anything ever again. 

 Harry rolls the stone into his palm and closes his eyes. The dead rise up around him, their forms almost solid but bleached of colour. How he wishes he could see the green of his mothers eyes, now. He tells himself not to reach out to them, the disappointment would be simply too much to bear.

 ‘We are….so proud of you.’

 ‘Quicker and easier than falling asleep.’

 ‘Until the very end.’

 The Resurrection Stone slips from his hand.

 And abruptly, Harry is in a clearing, a gathering of Death Eaters. Their Lord himself perched higher above, fingers twitching around the Elder Wand as if he had rightfully claimed it. Harry is glad he left his wand behind, as his hand clenches automatically around nothing but air, the movements too familiar. Automatic.

 Harry has never felt so distant. In this moment, his body feels like a shell, weightless, useless, as his mind retreats inward, and he watches Voldemort stand tall, and speak the words. He watches that lipless mouth form the spell of death.

 The green is blindingly bright. The skin of his hands itch terribly, fingers flexing.

 It grows closer, brighter. 

  And he thinks, _finally._

 And he draws in a sharp breathe and

 

 Unfortunately, the world is not a kind thing. Harry opens his eyes.  A different place that is not the Forbidden Forest rises up around him with a sickening speed. This place is crisp, the rush of wind over his skin feels distant, the light of a morning sun is a vague discomfort. There is no oppressive air. There is no gaunt, snake-like face hovering above him. He presses the side of his face into the moss, head heavy, leaden. The ache of his body is a terrible thing, so heavy and stiff are his muscles that he can barely move at all.

 A bird caws in the distance.

 And Harry remembers a dark night and a dying Unicorn, silvery blood seeping into the dirt, wasted. Harry remembers an afternoon and the body of Barty Crouch, dead, sightless. He remembers a rush of death, everybody pushing to the forefront of his mind like a damn broken, rushing, gushing. Blood splattering the internal of his mind. 

 A strange sound fills the air, a keening, high and weak.

 Harry feels his eyes burn with tears, and he swallows convulsively. 

 Remus’s fingers clutching Tonks’, their hands dirty and grey. The wailing of a lone Twin, siblings falling to their knees like puppets cut from their strings. Broken bodies and cold air, grasping hands. His godfather, falling, slipping between his fingers. 

 He lays there for a long time, or maybe minutes. The sun dips, slips into late afternoon, and he just lays there with his mind in turmoil. 

 If he were to ever let himself voice about the unfairness of the universe it would be now, alive where he should be dead, ashamed to feel no regret when those counting on him expected nothing more than his desire to survive. If it were to be anytime it would be now. But he is silent, his mouth gaping soundlessly, while his mind screams and thrashes and wails.

 Harry has known Death, seen it happen so endlessly around him, each time he begins to form attachments, the people, his family, are torn from him. Always putting a stop to that insistent, unbearable desire to find those he could love and be loved by.

  Time passes. The forest seems to grow thicker as morning turns to noon and the shadows lengthen. 

 Harry’s body is still just as heavy, so sore, so tired. 

 He listens to the rustle and patter of small creatures venturing out from their holes. Tiny insect legs tickle at his skin, smooth, furred wings fluttering.

 And then, 

 Loping, heavy footfalls and snuffling, panting breath against his cheek, by his ear. A wet nose ruffles his hair. Harry frowns, and lets himself roll onto his side instead of his stomach and squints against the furry snout pressing into his face. He lifts a weak hand and bats at it gently. A dog, he thinks, though it looks somewhat familiar, in the back of his mind. Not black, like Snuffles. He can’t recall if he knows any other dogs. 

 Exhaustion digs it’s fingers into Harry’s bones and begins to pull at him. He grunts in the back of his throat, annoyed, he wants to sit up and he wants to…..not, he doesn’t really want to find out what has happened. He just wants to sleep.

 Harry makes himself relax, sinks into the exhaustion with a reluctance that quickly fades. He is dimly aware of the dog’s huffing breath in the quiet, and then the warmth of its body as it slinks around him and settles down against his back, a line of comforting heat.

 

 There’s got to be a point, Harry thinks, where he is allowed to simply stop. 

 Stop caring, stop thinking, stop being. 

 There must be a stopping point when the universe kindly bows out and lets him go. It has to be coming soon, he thinks desperately. There’s only so much longer that he can go on like this. 

 He’s been fighting for so long. He’s tried so hard. Something has to give. 

 Lurking in the depths of his mind, perhaps its a nightmare, perhaps he’s dreaming. Harry stands in a misty graveyard with his shoulders up around his ears, fingers digging into the skin of his arms. His feet hurt like he’s been running for a long time and his eyes are dry and achey. Pinpricks of pain dance along his scar. Harry can feel the warmth of a trailing line of blood making its way down his face but he doesn’t do anything to wipe it away because he’s scared to move. It’s _cold._

 This graveyard is not The Graveyard. These headstones have no meaning to him, there’s no stone angel hunched over cracked grave. The air warps and shifts, the grass shivers beneath his sneakers. Harry hunches in on himself even further, theres something coming. It’s pressing in on the space around him like Dementor’s mist but it’s different and it’s scary and Harry closes his eyes so he won’t see and

 

 He twists beneath a heavy blanket and a pillow squishes under his cheek and it smells of lavender and sage. Reminds him of the perfume Aunt Petunia would wear for special occasions, how she would spritz it in the air before she left and it would drift through the vent of his cupboard and cling to the inside of his nose for hours. 

 He opens his eyes. He’s in a cottage, or a small house, warm and used and comfortable. He’s lying on a lumpy sofa with a thick woollen blanket draped over him  and everything is coloured in muted, natural tones. But it’s unfamiliar, and Harry thinks perhaps he should be worried. 

 Motion, at the edge of his periphery, stirs. His head is heavy, but he can turn and when he does there is a whistling in his ears like rushing wind and a swooping in his stomach as though he is falling from a great height. 

 ‘Remus?’ He says, though it comes out as a croak.

 The man, who is surely Remus Lupin and nobody else, gives him an odd look. He’s dressed in a red cardigan with patched elbows and t-shirt with some sort of rock band splashed across the front. Remus hovers over him for a long moment, studying his face intently, before settling down into the armchair across from him and setting a steaming tea cup on the coffee table. He looks….younger? Perhaps not as scarred. His hair has a few telltale greys but he looks overall more healthy than Harry as ever seen him. Those dark smudges beneath his eyes are gone and that gaunt look about him is absent. 

 ‘Hello.’ Remus says. Harry helplessly closes his eyes at hearing the mans crisp voice. ‘I wasn’t sure you would wake, but I’m glad to see you’re looking a bit better.’

 ‘Uh, yeah, yes.’ Harry managed to squeeze out through a tight throat. 

 ‘I can’t say that I know how you came to be in the forest, looking like you’ve just lost a few rounds with a Death Eater, but I’d appreciate you not returning my kindness in bringing you to my home by attacking me.’ And Harry notices then that Remus has his wand held comfortably in his hand, resting in his lap. 

 Harry clears his throat. ‘I-I won’t. Attack you, that is.’

 Giving him a resolute nod, Remus leans forward to pick up his tea again. 

 ‘Would you like a cuppa?’

 Harry’s head feels too heavy again, impossible to keep up. He can’t even raise a hand to rub at his aching eyes. The blanket is a pressing weight, and the room is filled with a rather cheery light, warm, comfortable in contrast to the odd, burning cold inside him. 

 ‘I think….I think I would like to sleep now.’ He says, and he doesn’t hear what Remus says before he slips under again. 

 It happens again. Waking, Remus, a cup of tea. He can’t seem to keep himself awake, always too heavy and too tired and strangely cold. There’s strange dreams, or maybe they’re not dreams, but they _are_ strange. He has a vague vision of falling to the dirt, invisibility cloak a softness under his belly and his glasses digging into the side of his face. Long hair falling over him, a hand clawing desperately against his chest, over his heart. 

 Dead, they say. _DeadDeadDead._

 A cruel laugh, gloating. The world is on fire before Harry descends back into endless sleep.

 The fireplace is the only source of light when Remus approaches him and Harry manages to keep his eyes firmly open. Harry accepts the cup of tea with a weariness that embarrasses him, sipping the piping hot tea stubbornly despite how the cup quakes in his grip.

 ‘Would you like to talk now?’ Remus asks quietly, a request disguised as a gentle query.

 Harry nods slowly and pulls himself into a sitting position. He ends up slouched against the armrest of the sofa. He doesn’t know what to say.

 ‘Where are we?’ He finds himself asking, instead. 

 ‘This is my cottage, my home. Though I’m not sure I’ll tell you its exact location yet.’ Remus leans forward, his eyes crinkling in faint amusement. ‘I found you within the boundaries, this house is surrounded by forest and I was, well, I was out and about.’ 

 Harry nods. ‘That time of month?’

 For a moment Remus’s eyes seem to flash, a flicker of gold, before he sits back and dips his head in acknowledgement or perhaps defeat. His shoulders slump, and Harry feels a deep surge of guilt, though he can’t quiet put a finger on why. 

 ‘Yes.’ Remus muses. ‘I suppose we can call it that. Hm, I found you unconscious out in the forest, you were injured, and seemed quiet unable to look after yourself at the time, so I brought back with me in the morning.’

 Here, Remus pauses and sips his tea. His eyes focus on the cup in Harry’s hands, gives a little gesture.

 ‘You had that when I found you, I couldn’t heal it by magical means, so I’ve just tried to disinfect it and keep it clean the muggle way.’

 Furrowing his brow in confusion, Harry peels his right hand away from the cup, only now noticing the neat, white bandage wrapped around his palm. It throbs sharply when he flexes his fingers and he shoots Remus a look.

 ‘What is it? I don’t remember hurting my hand.’

 ‘Well, what _do_ you remember? Because, frankly, I haven’t the slightest idea how you got through the wards of my property, nor how you’re even awake right now with your core magic levels riding so low. I’m also utterly baffled as to why the Wolf decided not to kill you as soon as it sensed you inside its territory.’ Remus seems to run out of steam by the end of this outburst, and he leans forward to put his cup on the coffee table and runs both hands down his tired face.

 ‘And now you’re simply sitting there, not looking overly worried or frightened, listening to me without a hint of doubt or suspicion.’ The last words are said accusingly, as though Harry being so trusting is upsetting.

 Harry looks quickly down, picks at the woollen crochet blanket with his injured hand. 

 ‘I trust you.’ He says. But it must be the wrong thing to say, as the other man can’t seem to contain his irritation.

 ‘No, but, hm, see? You don’t know me, you’ve clearly figured out that I’m a Werewolf, I’ve no idea how, and you don’t seem the slightest bit afraid to be in a stranger’s home.’ 

 Opening his mouth, Harry goes to say, _but I do know you_. And stops.

 Remus…..Remus appears not to recognise him. Hasn’t called him Harry, hasn’t looked at him with any hint of familiarity that he used to. Perhaps this isn’t even Remus, because Remus…..well, Remus died, didn’t he?

 ‘I don’t know what to say, everything feels wrong.’ Harry ends up saying lamely. 

 ‘Okay, okay.’

 They sit in silence for a long moment. 

 ‘I think this situation is better handled by someone else. I’m sure you’ve done nothing wrong, and are in fact just someone needing a little help, but in these times, you can never be too careful.’ Remus says.

 Harry’s shoulders tighten up.

 ‘These times?’

 ’The…the war, the war that’s been dragging on for almost thirty years in the Wizarding World-Are you okay?’

 Harry has closed his eyes tight, this can’t be right, something is _wrong_. He’s woken up into a nightmare. The First War, the one that ended on the night his parents died and the second at the moment he sacrificed himself, it’s still going? What more can Harry give? What else is there to lose? _What is going on?_

 Harry opens his eyes and looks beyond Remus at the darkened window.

 ‘I’m fine.’ He says, and takes a sip of his tea. 

 

 Harry drifts in and out of an uneasy sleep that night. Remus seems to trust him enough to sleep in another room of the house, out of direct line of sight. Or perhaps the man has a monitoring spell on him. In the early hours of the morning he hobbles to the bathroom, body weirdly stiff and hot and tight and uncomfortable. He glances at his pale reflection in the little mirror above the sink, then sets about unwrapping the gauze on his injured hand. The wound is….bizarre. As if someone has taken a butter knife to the soft flesh of his palm to carve out an unfamiliar symbol. It starts as a circle, large enough to cover most of his palm, and inside there is a marking like a backwards ’N’ with several slashes through it. 

 Feeling sick, Harry quickly wraps the bandage around his hand and leaves the bathroom. He doesn’t understand whats going on, he wants to sleep and maybe not wake up until the world is silent and easy. Or maybe not at all. 

 Drained from that small trip to the bathroom, Harry shuffles back to the couch and wraps himself up in the borrowed blanket, but he doesn’t sleep.

 

 ‘I’m afraid your clothes were a bit of a lost cause so, here, you can borrow these. They might be a little big, but they’re warm.’ Remus says, when it’s a reasonable hour and they’ve eaten a breakfast of toast and jam that sits heavy in Harry’s stomach.

 Harry is handed a bundle of clothes, a woollen sweater that hangs over his hands, its blue and red and fuzzy. The pants he has to roll up over his feet and the shoes are a little hard to walk in. He feels better, being properly dressed, but also like he’s a child playing dress up in his father’s clothes. 

 ‘I’m done.’ Harry says, stepping out into the living room where Remus is tidying up the sofa. He turns and gives Harry a gentle smile, and then motions him toward the front of the house. He’s changed too, with a scarf wrapped around his neck.

 ‘We’ll have to apparate, I’m afraid, I don’t have a floo connection to this place.’ It’s cold outside, misty, but looking like it’s going to be a nice day later on. Harry squints against the brightness. He hasn’t got his glasses. Nor his wand or his cloak or….anything, really. And perhaps Harry should be more worried about how un-worried he is.

 ‘Have you apparated before?’ Remus asks kindly.

 ‘Yeah, a few times.’

 And Remus nods, and holds out his arm for Harry to grab onto. 

 He murmurs gently, ‘Hold on tight.’ And then Harry is being whisked away, compressed and pulled apart and then landing jarringly again. Harry stumbles, barely keeps his feet under him until Remus grabs his arm.  He lets go quickly again, which leaves Harry floundering.

 ‘Alright there?’ He asks, and Harry can only nod, feeling a little queasy. 

 He knows where they are, the street is oh, so familiar and the sight of it sets a ringing in his head. 

 Grimmauld place is just as old and dark, but less dusty, than the last time Harry had seen it. He follows closely behind Remus, there’s a whirling in his gut, a tightening of his chest as if his ribcage is slowly contracting. 

 Along the walls, the portraits are blank, there are no sneering faces watching them, there’s no shrieking, wailing curses of Walburga Black. Even the stuffed elf heads are gone. Remus scuffs his feet on the doormat, and then beckons Harry forward, hand a hairsbreadth from touching his shoulder, but never making contact. Gooseflesh rises along the bare skin of Harry’s arms. 

 ‘You alright, there?’ 

 Harry nods, and drops his eyes down to the borrowed shoes on his feet. He focuses on the dark patterns of the rug disappearing beneath him and the smell of the musty air and the sound of Remus’s breathing close by. His hands flex, unbearable tension wanting to tighten every muscle, to make a fist that he can shake and hit, maybe to feel something different. 

 ‘Down here,’ Remus murmurs, folds his hands into his coat pockets. ‘Sit down and I’ll make you a cuppa.’

 As if Harry hasn’t had more tea in the previous two days that he has in the past seventeen years. 

 Down into the basement, the long, fire-lit kitchen is remarkably similar to what Harry is used to. Dusty, dirty, but well used. With a flick of Remus’s wand, the kettle on the stove begins to boil and cups and sauces and a tin of biscuits drifts over to the end of the table. The ease of such mundane, but intricate, magic reminds Harry of the last time he saw Remus as Professor Lupin. The werewolf had looked worn down and weary at his desk as all of his possession packed themselves neatly into their cases. Harry curls his fingers against the phantom feel of the Marauders Map returned to his possession. 

 They’re just sitting down, Harry beside Remus and with their backs to the crackling fireplace, when there’s the drum of feet banging down the stairs and a familiar figure bursts into the kitchen. 

 ‘Moony! Mate, you coulda given me a tad more notice before showing up!’ Sirius barks out with a laugh. He rounds the table and claps Remus on the shoulder, his appearance fills the kitchen with a sort of frenetic energy, all movement and buzz and there’s a low level hum of magic in the air.  

 Harry stares a the man who is…no, who _looks_ like his deceased godfather. He still short, but gangly, aristocratic face framed by damp curls as if he’s just gotten out of the shower. He, like Remus, looks younger and more alive. Youthful, his cheeks full and eyes sparkling. He doesn’t look like a man who survived a decade in prison. 

 ‘And who’s this chap then? You’ve a son you’ve been hiding from us, Moony?’ Sirius asks cheerfully, though his gaze is perceptively sharp, raking over Harry’s face, his borrowed clothes, the bandaged hand holding an uneaten biscuit. Harry ducks his head, scrubs a hand over the back of his neck feeling awkward under the scrutiny. 

 ‘Not now, Sirius, we’ll talk about this when Dumbledore arrives.’ Remus says calmly.

 ‘Oooh, something important then? You got some serious gossip for us do you?’

 Harry ignores the questions and settles into his seat. He’s still so tired and the warmth of the fireplace at his back is making him drowsy, eyes heavy.

 

 ‘…saying he just appeared out of nowhere? But your anti-apparition wards are up, yeah?’

 ‘Of course they’re up, I always check before the full moon.’

 ‘But….how?’

 ‘I don’t _know_ , James.’

 ‘And you say he-”

 ‘Leave him be, James.’

 The conversation going on around Harry isn’t making much sense, but that may be because everything feels muddles and swirly. He’s very cold, especially his fingers and his toes and his knees. Tingly like  he’s lost feeling in them. A shiver seems to have taken over his muscles, vibrating his bones, makes him ache. None of this is helped by the ice that is draped over his forehead and eyes, trails of cold oozing down the sides of his face.

 And he’s lying down, apparently. Hadn’t he been sitting at the table, only moments ago?

 An uncoordinated flop of his arm knocks the damp cloth from his face and Harry blinks up at the kitchen ceiling in confusion.

 ‘Oh, there you are dear.’ Mrs Weasley announces gently, and she smooths his damp fringe to the side with a light stroke. ‘Gave us a bit of a scare there, but you’re right now.’

 ‘What happ’nd? Harry mumbles, his mouth tastes like static and everything has an oddly slow quality to it.

 ‘You had a bit of a fit, dear, nothing to worry about, nothing to worry about.’ 

 A fit? He’d just fallen asleep for a moment, hadn’t he?

 After a moment they help him to sit up at the table again and leave him be, talking amongst themselves. There’s more than just Sirius and Remus. Harry lets his gaze flitter from one face to the next, never settling completely on one person and remarkably glad that without his glasses he can’t focus on the minute details. He looks from Mrs Weasley and her husband, to Kingsley and Tonks and members of the Order who look younger and fresher than he’s ever seen them. It takes Harry a long moment to recognise the Longbottoms, Alice with a round face and lively eyes and Frank standing tall and strong. A moment, a flicker of their other selves superimposes over them, contorted into a wretched sort of vacancy and insanity, before the vision fades away leaving these bright, alive people behind.

 Harry ducks his head, feels his shoulders hunch forward around his ears. His wrapped hand aches and he forces himself to relax his fingers with a small flex. The fireplace behind him gives a dull roar and the kitchen is bathed in a warm green light as someone floos in. 

 - a lipless mouth peeled back into a snarl, slitted eyes and a heaviness in the air as the killing curse hurtles toward him-

 With a gasp, Harry sucks back in the pained noise that tries to gurgle up his throat and barely manages to suppress it. He’s broken out into a sweat though, his body is still so very cold and it just makes him shiver all the more. His fingertips tingle uncomfortably. 

 ‘Ah, Severus, you’ve finally decided to grace us with your presence!’ Harry hears Sirius say in a mocking voice, the edges of his voice turning sharp. Snape, when he speaks up from behind him, sounds as droll and unhappy as ever. 

 ‘If you’d rather I keep this information to myself, Black, I’d be more than happy to. As it is, I’ve decided to risk my own life in bringing it to you in the vain hope that you’ll somehow make use of it.’

 ‘Fuck off, Snivellus, we don’t need whatever bogus lies you’ve come up with to ingratiate yourself to the Headmaster-’

 ‘If anyone needs to prove their worth, mutt-’

 Harry looks up, then, having sunk lower in his seat the longer Snap hovers behind him. He finds himself watching the woman in front of him with the red hair, at the way her eyes dart from one man to the other guiltily. She chews on her bottom lip, looking unhappy but seemingly unwilling to step in and say anything. Harry has to look away as something in his head begins to ache as he watches her. The insults hurl back and forth for another moment before the fireplace blazes green again and Snape is forced to move aside to allow the newcomer room. A hush. The air itself feels thicker with magic, and Harry thinks the person stepping through must be very powerful. The anxiety in his chest squeezes tighter. 

 ‘Lovely, you’ve all arrived safely, then.’ A deceptively frail voice announces, and Harry closes his eyes.

 A quiet murmur of greeting as Dumbledore moves into the room. He’s aware of the scrutiny, the immediate focus that the man bestows upon him before he’s even sat down and it makes him want to shrivel up and hide. He can’t stop himself though, from raising his gaze from his hands to the dead man entering his field of view. Unchanged, immediately recognisable, the man commands respect without a word. There is no recognition in that face, in the congenial, polite way he looks at Harry.

 And Harry averts his gaze from those terribly familiar eyes, unable to bear the full force of them at the moment, and vaguely recollects his Occlumency lessons. Eye contact aids in Legilimency, and Harry doesn’t really want this Dumbledore who does not recognise him to rummage through his mind. 

 ‘Now,’ This Dumbledore says, once the great folds of his robe have settled around him. ‘I think introductions are in order.’

 And Harry, well, Harry has to ignore the pressure at the back of his eyes and the tightness of his throat. He flexes his fingers against the tabletop in agitation. He won’t let it get to him, that he has to introduce himself to the man who guided him through the Wizarding world, acted like a loving grandfather, and then lead him to his death. 

 

 

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> So, I know this is an old hat, the dead parents alive and all that. But it's something I've really wanted to write and had a bit of fun with!  
> I'm unsure if anyone will want me to continue, but we shall see :)


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